There's a problem with your browser or settings.

Your browser or your browser's settings are not supported. To get the best experience possible, please download a compatible browser. If you know your browser is up to date, you should check to ensure that
javascript is enabled.

Search Langley

Text Size

FS-2004-02-83-LaRC

NASA Technology Could Help Decrease Air Traffic Delays

Researchers at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton,
Va., are developing technology for airliners that could help
decrease air traffic delays and may help reduce air traffic
controllers’ work loads.

Researchers used a NASA 757
research aircraft to demonstrate the Advanced Terminal Area
Approach Spacing computer-based tool at Chicago's O'Hare
International Airport.

One piece of that puzzle is an airborne computer system called
ATAAS or Advanced Terminal Area Approach Spacing that would give
pilots automatic speed information and guidance so that planes can
be precisely spaced on their final approach into the airport.

NASA Langley research pilots Jeff Moultrie (left) and
Harry Verstynen tested the approach spacing system
in a simulator patterned after a B 757-200.

Unlike drivers on the ground who can judge time and distance by
car lengths, pilot can’t always see the traffic in front of
them. They depend on air traffic controllers who are in charge of
guiding aircraft in for landings, especially during bad
weather.

To keep planes safely on track, controllers issue control
instructions over the radio to the many pilots in the air on
approach. These instructions include the speeds, altitudes and
headings the pilots have to sustain to land safely and
efficiently.

NASA’s ATAAS computer-based tool automatically calculates
the speed and distances between aircraft that pilots need to
maintain and sends that information to displays in the cockpit.

With ATAAS, cockpit navigation displays would show pilots additional information on approach.

ATAAS also incorporates Global Positioning System (GPS)
satellite signals and Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast
(ADS-B) technology to give flight crews their own location, the
identity of the traffic in front of them, a history of where the
lead aircraft has been and the best position of their plane for a
precisely-spaced landing.

NASA researchers developed and analyzed the ATAAS computer
software in an air traffic operations lab at NASA Langley. Then
they tested it, with the help of a number of experienced pilots, in
one of NASA Langley’s cockpit motion facility simulators.

The ATAAS system was demonstrated for the first time in a real
world environment in September, 2002 at one of the busiest airports
in the world, Chicago’s O’Hare International
Airport.

A former B757-200 airliner now used as a NASA flying laboratory
was outfitted with the equipment to support the approach spacing
concept.

The Airborne Research Integrated Experiments System or ARIES
aircraft recorded data to validate the ATAAS system with the help
of two other aircraft, a Rockwell Collins Sabreliner and a Piper
Chieftain, owned by Chicago-based Aviation Navigation Satellite
Program, Inc.

The three planes flew a number of approaches at night into
O’Hare to show that the software can offer more delivery
precision than is currently available, because of approach speed
variability, radar inaccuracies and flight technical errors.

More precision would potentially give airports a more consistent
traffic flow and the ability to better adhere to schedules.

NASA researchers say the approach spacing tool is one concept
that could help air terminal congestion in the short term, until
airports can expand to meet future demand.

For more information, please call the NASA
Langley Public Affairs Office at 757 864-6124
or visit LARC Home
Page.